Original title: Urease Inhibitor and gibberellic acid reduce nitrogen losses and improve maize performance in a semi-arid soil
Urea is a common nitrogen fertilizer, but some of its nitrogen can escape into the air as gases. In a maize field experiment, a urease inhibitor—a substance that slows the process releasing ammonia from urea—reduced ammonia loss and nitrous oxide emissions compared with urea alone. Adding gibberellic acid, a plant growth hormone, gave the strongest crop response: more fertilizer nitrogen was recovered, and the plants produced more grain and took up more nitrogen. The experiment took place in semi-arid, low-organic-matter soil.
Imagine watering a garden with a leaky hose. Some water escapes before it reaches the plants, and even water that arrives may not help the plants grow equally well. In this paper, the urease inhibitor is like reducing the leak, while gibberellic acid helps the maize make better use of what reaches it.
In semi-arid, low-organic-matter soils, some fertilizer nitrogen escapes into the air instead of feeding crops. This field experiment suggests that treating urea with a urease inhibitor can reduce those losses, while adding gibberellic acid can further improve maize growth and nitrogen use.
The abstract reports a field experiment conducted at one research farm during summer 2021, in semi-arid, low-organic-matter soil. It does not establish whether the results hold in other soils, climates, crops, or seasons, or report the treatments' costs.
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Urease Inhibitor and gibberellic acid reduce nitrogen losses and improve maize performance in a semi-arid soil — Khadim Dawar, Ishaq Ahmad Mian, Shadman Khan et al. — Scientific Reports — doi:10.1038/s41598-026-72557-0
Abstract licence: CC BY
Explanation generated by Synthesis from the abstract — it is not the original paper.